Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Yeoman

Yeo′man, n.; pl. Yeomen (#). [OE. yoman, ȝeman, ȝoman; of uncertain origin; perhaps the first, syllable is akin to OFries. gā district, region, G. gau, OHG. gewi, gouwi, Goth. gawi. √100.]

1. A common man, or one of the commonly of the first or most respectable class; a freeholder; a man free born.

☞ A yeoman in England is considered as next in order to the gentry. The word is little used in the United States, unless as a title in law proceedings and instruments, designating occupation, and this only in particular States.

2. A servant; a retainer. [Obs.]

A yeman hadde he and servants no mo. Chaucer.

3. A yeoman of the guard; also, a member of the yeomanry cavalry. [Eng.]

4. (Naut.) An interior officer under the boatswain, gunner, or carpenters, charged with the stowage, account, and distribution of the stores.

Yeoman of the guard, one of the bodyguard of the English sovereign, consisting of the hundred yeomen, armed with partisans, and habited in the costume of the sixteenth century. They are members of the royal household.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.